This is again, one of those strange situations that you pretty much would only see in ICU, but thought I would share it anyway.
A couple of days ago my supervisor allocated me a patient and told me to go and assess her and then report back to her with my problem list and treatment plan.
I began reading the patient's notes and quickly realised that the patient had been classified as "brain dead". The Dr had just completed the final set of tests which confirmed the diagnosis and they were about to inform the family.
I assessed the patient and determined that impaired airway clearance and reduced lung volumes were the patients 2 main problems. At first I wondered why my supervisor had asked me to assess and treat a patient whose ventilator was about to be switched off. After discussion with the nurse though, I quickly realised that the doctors were hopeful that the patients family would consent to organ donation.
So, when reporting back to my supervisor, she was happy when I outlined the patient's assessment findings and treatment plan as normal. I guess the point I am trying to make is that when confronted with a diagnosis like brain death where we know that the patient will not survive no matter what treatment we give- at first glance it may seem pointless to treat them. However, looking beyond the patient at the bigger picture- if those lungs are going to be donated to another patient, they need to be as healthy as possible. This is where physios actually have a very important role and the patient should be treated to the best of our ability, just like any other.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
1 comment:
Wow you sound like you handled that quite well. I remember a similar situation I had in ICU, which I felt was extremely daunting for me. A man, I think had been declared braindead, was about to be extubated, and basically was going to be left in comfort until he passed away. I was asked to suction him before the removal of the airway. I was initially quite shocked at that. I guess I felt that it was only going to delay the inevitable, and was actually really hurtful. My supervisor explained to me the minimal chances of his being able to make some recovery and survive. Regardless, it was just going to make him more comfortable for a while. This experience opened my eyes to the sort of emotionally charged situations I was about to be exposed to in this line of work, that’s for sure.
Post a Comment